Description:This article documents the initial reactions of some of the first users of a garden for blind and visually impaired people that opened at Queen’s Park, Harborne on 31 July 1953.<sup><small>1</small></sup> The Parks Committee minutes contain a description of the proposed garden, which was intended to ‘supplement the pleasure and enjoyment which sighted persons derive’ from the city’s parks. The grass terrace to Court Oak House at Queen’s Park was chosen because it was easily accessible to people living or working at the college for blind and visually impaired children and adults on Court Oak Road, used by a quarter of Birmingham’s blind population. The college had been established as a school by the Birmingham Institution for the Blind in 1904. In 1918 it took over the supervision of blind home workers in Staffordshire, Warwickshire and Worcestershire. Students were being given a technical education there by the 1930s, and in 1958 the technical department was extended and renamed the Queen Alexandra Technical College for the Blind.<sup><small>2</small></sup> The minutes describe features of the garden that stimulated senses other than the visual. These included raised banks so that people could enjoy the scents of flowers, plants and aromatic shrubs without stooping; a raised pool with a fountain so that people could hear the splashing water; nesting boxes to encourage birds; paths with different textures to give guidance to users; plant labels in Braille, and a metal embossed plan showing the layout of the garden to allow new users to become familiar with it. Some of these ideas were apparently taken from an article in Vision–The Popular Magazine about the Eyes, which was read by members of the Parks Committee and described similar gardens in a park in Exeter established in 1939, and more recently at a park in Morecambe.<sup><small>3</small></sup>
The efforts made by the Parks Committee to provide innovative facilities in the parks for different sections of Birmingham’s population suggest a more flexible attitude towards public spaces after the Second World War,<sup><small>4</small></sup> and the newspaper article indicates that the garden was popular with its intended users. However, the radio producer Charles Parker carried out a series of interviews with people living and working at the technical college in Harborne in the mid 1960s as part of his research for a programme about the provision of education and care for blind and visually impaired people in Britain. Although many of the interviewees spoke vividly about their experience of visual impairment and their heightened awareness of smells, sounds and textures, interestingly, none of the children or adults referred to using the garden at Queen’s Park.<sup><small>5</small></sup>
<font color="#666633"><small><sup>1</sup> BCC Parks Committee Minutes, 27 July 1953 [BA&H: BCC 1 BO/1/1/30]
<sup>2</sup> Birmingham Charity for the Blind and Visually Impaired website, http://www.brib.org.uk/events.htm accessed July 2010
<sup>3</sup> BCC Parks Committee Minutes, 5 January 1953 [BA&H: BCC 1 BO/1/1/29]
<sup>4</sup> This can also be seen in plans for adventure playgrounds in Birmingham’s parks in the 1950s, and in the development of the Midlands Arts Centre in Cannon Hill Park from 1960
<sup>5</sup> Actuality recordings for 'The Blind Set' [BA&H: MS 4000/6/1/54]</small></font>